Recount granted in Cork North Central

A recount to decide the fifth and final seat in Cork North Central is to begin at 10am this morning.

Labour Cllr Eoghan Kenny took the last seat at around 1am following a battle with incumbent TD Mick Barry of PBP. Barry requested a recount and was granted one as Cllr Kenny was voted in ahead of Barry by 35 votes.

Some might say Barry is a clairvoyant as his ad in last week’s Cork Independent included the line ‘Battle for the last seat’!

The first candidate over the line is this five-seater constituency was Thomas Gould of Sinn Féin who was re-elected to the Dáil as was Fianna Fáil Padráig O’Sullivan who took the second seat and Fine Gael’s Colm Burke. Independent Ireland candidate Cllr Ken O’Flynn was also elected yesterday.

Cork South Central

This count finished up yesterday and was always going to be one of the most interesting constituencies when the results started to come in. This area had four TDs representing it, but it is now a five seater constituency. These were An Tánaiste Micheál Martin (Fianna Fáil) and Sinn Féin’s Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire. Simon Coveney of Fine Gael has now retired from politics while Michael McGrath (Fianna Fáil) was appointed EU Commisioner designate for Democracy, Justice and Rule of Law earlier this year. His brother Cllr Seamus McGrath was picked by the party to run.

The elected TDs are:

Micheál Martin (FF)

Seamus McGrath (FF)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (SF)

Jerry Buttimer (FG)

Pádraig Rice (SD)

Cork East

This constituency has two new faces representing it – Social Democrats Cllr Liam Quaide and Fine Gael Cllr Noel McCarthy. Mark Stanton (Fine Gael) had hoped to replace his retiring father David but didn’t get enough votes to do so. Incumbent TDs James O’Connor (FF) and Pat Buckley (SF) retained their seats.

Cork North West

Incumbent Fianna Fáil TDs Andrias Moynihan and Michael Moynihan retained their seats in this three-seater constituency. The other spot was taken by Fine Gael Cllr John Paul O’Shea and all were elected on the sixth count.

Previously this Fine Gael seat was held by Michael Creed and his cousin also named Michael Creed (Cork County Councillor) was a candidate; however O’Shea was the other Fine Gael candidate elected here.

Cork South West

As you were. Nothing changed in this three seater constituency with all outgoing TDs retaining their seats. These are Social Democrats leader Holly Cairns who gave birth on Friday, congratulations! Fianna Fáil’s Christopher O’Sullivan and Independent Ireland leader Michael Collins took the other seats with Collins topping the poll.